We had never been on a cruise before. Our 10th wedding anniversary was coming up and I really wanted to do something special. I LOVE Disneyworld and KNEW that a Disney Cruise had to be awesome. So, I managed to talk my husband into spending a week at Disneyworld, followed by a 7 night Caribbean cruise on the Disney Fantasy. I'll post about DisneyWorld some other time. :) My parents joined us. So yes, there were 4 adults, and 0 children with us. But let me tell you, you don't need kids to have fun on a Disney Cruise! (2 adults in their 30s, 2 in their 50s.)
We stayed at the Caribbean Beach Resort at Disneyworld the night before our cruise. (A hotel I HIGHLY recommend.) We had the option of taking Disney's bus transportation to the cruise ship for $35 per person per way. We decided we wanted to arrive as early as possible and we didn't want to arrive with a bus load of others, so we rented a "Limo" from http://www.happylimo.com/. They don't actually drive you in a limo, we were in a suburban. But it was actually a bit cheaper since there were 4 of us going. (Me, my husband, my mom and my dad.) One thing I will say, be VERY honest with the number of bags you have with you. The 4 of us had 10 bags and 4 carryons, so had they come in a sedan..(like they tried for the trip home..) NO WAY would we have fit. Mind you.. we had WAY too much stuff, but I'll get to that later. :) The drive is about 1 hour from Disneyworld to Port Canaveral. I cannot even begin to describe the excitement level as we crossed this huge bridge to the Port and got our first glimpse of the ship. WOW! It was so huge and exciting I was about bouncing out of my seat. I'm in my 30s and I felt about 10 years old at that moment.
The driver dropped us off at the port terminal. You get out of the car, and a Disney employee is waiting there to check in your bags. Have your cruise packet with you. (Disney mails this to you once your trip is paid in full.) They take all your checked in bags from the car, and deliver them to your stateroom. You can keep a carryon with you. Here was our first big mistake. I had read all the different blogs about what you should keep with you at all times, and instead of picking and choosing, I brought it ALL. You know, just in case. We had HUGE HEAVY carryon bags. Oops. Not necessary. We were so weighed down, that we didn't explore the terminal at all and when we got on the ship we didn't' want to do anything because our stuff was heavy. Here is what you ACTUALLY need with you. 1. Your key to the world card which they will give you at check in. 2. any medications you have to have. 3. sunglasses 4. your passport, ID, wallet, etc. 5. your camera with memory card and batteries. 6. Really, that's it. You can carry more if you want, but it's just stuff to slow you down. The less you carry into the terminal the happier you will be. They deliver all your stuff around 3-4pm. (even though they say it could be as late as 8pm) Chances are pretty good that you will not get onboard until around 1-2pm. So.. you can live without all the other stuff for a couple of hours. Some people like to wear or bring their swimsuits so they can play on the Aqua Duck (waterslide) before it gets crowded, but if this is your first time on the ship, you will have SOO much more to go look at that you will forget all about the aqua duck. (For now, don't worry, there is plenty of time for it later!)
Ok, back to the port terminal. You enter at the ground floor and go through medal detectors. Basically if you can't get it through airport security, don't try to get it through Disney security. Then you head up this huge escalator to the terminal waiting area. An employee will be pointing you to where you need to go to check in. They give you your key to the world card, (room key and how you buy anything onboard), then they give you a card with your boarding group number. The earlier you arrive, the sooner you can get on the ship, so I recommend getting there as soon as you can. We were in boarding group 12 and we were onboard by 12:30pm. The terminal has a ton of stuff to see and do. One thing I wish we had noticed.. there is an outdoor viewing platform where you can see the ship. GO OUT THERE! The ship is seriously impressive when you are that close to it. We had so much junk with us, we basically found a chair and waited. They have movies playing for the kids, Characters come out for pictures, plenty of displays to look at, all kinds of stuff. But.. we just sat there.
As you are boarding they will take your picture. ALWAYS hand them your own camera as well. They will take pictures with your camera anywhere they are taking professional pictures. Trust me, buying there pictures is EXPENSIVE. Use your own camera as much as you can unless you budgeted about $400 for their shots. When you board, the cast members (employees) announce your family over the loud speakers as you walk into the grand atrium. It's kinda a fun movie star like experience. I knew this was coming so I had my video camera up and caught it on tape. It was seriously fun. Then you walk through a line of clapping cast members, and the ship is yours! Your room key probably won't work just yet unless you board after 2pm. We decided to go up to the top deck look around and get some lunch. (but remember those heavy carry ons.. yep, still lugging them around!) The deck is amazing. Everyone is happy and smiling and you can't help but smile back. We decided we didn't' want to walk around too much until we got rid of those dang carry-ons, so we went to Cabana's for lunch. Cabana's is a huge buffet on Deck 11. We found an awesome seat. The restaurant is laid out with these big sweeping arches that actually stick out over the water on the side of the ship. if you can get the table in the corner of one of these arches, you are hanging over the side of the ship and there are floor to ceiling windows. Pretty AMAZING place to eat your first Disney meal. And the food... holy crow it's awesome! So much variety, and so much good stuff. The buffet is come and go as you please sort of serving style, so there is no waiting in a huge long line. Just walk up to the item you want and grab it!
After we finished eating, THANKFULLY our room was ready. No, they don't announce it or anything, but we were so tired of carrying our cra...er..junk around that we went down to our stateroom and tried our key. They worked! We were in rooms 8066 and 8064 on the Disney Fantasy. We were actually on the 9th EVER sailing of the Fantasy, so everything was brand new and beautiful. The rooms have PLENTY of closet space even for us over-packers. And the Verandah was amazing. Seriously. If you can't afford the room with the Verandah... Save up for a year and go when you can. Having that deck in our stateroom was one of my FAVORITE parts. I loved being able to sit out there and just watch the ocean. So relaxing and amazing. The rooms are great for sound proof. The only time I could hear the neighbors was when we were both out on the verandah. We had an adjoining door to our parents room, and the verandah's were adjoining as well. Mind you, this just means that half of the divider opens up on the verandah. It does not mean you get a twice as long of a deck. (You have to turn sideways to fit through.) But there is a normal door on the inside that goes into the other stateroom, so that made things easy.
Our room ready for sleeping. Every day the room attendant visits your room twice. Once in the morning, to clean, and once in the afternoon to get it ready for going to bed. Disney is awesome. The room attendants leave towel animals in your room. A different one each night.
After we dropped off our junk, FINALLY, we went back up on deck for the sail away party. SO MUCH FUN! We liked being up on deck 12 for this. We could still look down to deck 11 where Mickey and the gang were singing and partying, but we could also look over the deck rail and watch Port Canaveral disappear. In the picture below, Deck 11 is the one with the pool, Deck 12 is the walkway I'm standing on. The stage is actually behind me in this picture.
The deck party was awesome. Anytime they are doing deck parties, go join in the fun. It's a great time to be silly, laugh, and have fun with the Disney gang. And no, it's NOT geared to little kids. It was enjoyed by every single person on deck. Oh, and a fun side note, if you can look over the rail down to the port terminal, the cast members on shore come outside and wave at the ship wearing giant Mickey Hands. It's fun to see. And while you are there... look for the "hidden" Mickey's in the terminals architecture. :)
After the deck party, we hung out on deck watching the shore disappear. Then we explored the ship a bit. Disney does dinners on a restaurant rotation schedule. Each night you eat at one of the main dining halls. Your servers follow you to each restaurant. This is good and bad. Let me explain. Our first night we had dinner at the "Royal Table". Beautiful restaurant made to look like a banquet hall in a castle. Our table was kinda a crappy location. We were in a side room overlooking the main atrium. Why was this crappy, well, because they were doing professional photoshoots in the atrium. So that means.. the whole room flashed every few seconds as the photographer took pictures. It got VERY annoying. We also couldn't see into the main room, so it felt a bit claustrophobic. Some people probably like it for it's "privacy", but it was too closeted feeling for me. Anyway, the food was excellent. The portions seemed a bit small, but you can ALWAYS ask for seconds. One fun trick we learned... If you have any kind of food allergy, you can actually order your meal for the next night while eating tonight's meal. Actually, they MAKE you order before hand. I'm allergic to nuts, so by ordering the night before, any item that may have had nuts in it, would be made without them, so I could get anything, and they brought it out faster than any other table. Another quick tip. My mom and I LOVE fruit. So, on the first night we mentioned this to our server. She brought us out a plate of fruit EVERY NIGHT of the cruise as our "appetizer". It was awesome! The other tables around us were jealous until we told them to ask for it, then we all had a big plate of different fruit each night. So, if there is something unusual you want... ASK FOR IT. Chance are really good you'll get it and more.
So, why was I saying that having the same server every night can be a bad thing? After all, they brought us fruit, knew our names, knew how fast we wanted our meal to come and even had drinks waiting for us at the table. Well... Our main server made me really mad on the first night. She said something that I'm SURE she thought was really funny, but I took it as REALLY insulting. Since I'm a wuss and didn't speak up and ask for a new server, I had to see this lady every single night even though I was still hurting from her foreign sense of humor. I truly believe the comment was funny if I was from her culture, but I'm not, so it was insulting. I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, but all week I was on edge every time she talked to me waiting to be insulted again. That was silly of me, it put a damper on each evening. Next time.. I'll just ask for a new server.
Before you leave for your cruise.. Call the Disney Customer service line and request that your table be near the windows or the screens at dinner. Not only do you get the same server, you also get the same table each time. I thought our table placement was kinda cruddy since we were too far away from the windows, or TV screens to see anything properly. But I learned you can call ahead and ask for good table placement if you call after you have paid your cruise in full.
Me and my husband at Royal Table
My parents
The first night, I got a bit of motion sickness. Well, Not sick really, but I felt... off. It was like my head was trying to hold still but my body was moving. It was made a bit worse because at dinner I was facing a porthole. It was pretty far away, but it made it look like we were on level with the water and I could really see it moving. I ended up switching seats with my dad so I faced away from the window, and immediately felt better. But wait you say. Didn't you JUST tell us to request a window seat?? Yes I did, and I stand by it. After the first night, that feeling completely went away. And when you eat at Animators palate, you NEED to be near the walls so you can talk to Crush. (More of that later) If we hit a big wave or something I'd get momentarily dizzy, but it would pass quickly and was just kinda funny. Never took any meds for it, and none of the rest of the family seemed to have any problems. But the ships health center does have motion sickness pills if you need them.
After dinner we went to the opening nights show. I have a degree in Theatre, and can I just say WOW! Disney knows how to put on a Broadway style show that is worthy of your time! Having said this, I will say that the opening show and the closing nights show are the two that if you need to skip them, it's ok to do so. They are entertaining, but basically the opening nights show is a big advertisement for all you can do on the ship. And the closing nights show is an advertisement for buying the pictures the professionals took. It's presented in a fun, entertaining way, so you won't regret it if you go to those two shows, but you won't miss anything if you decide to roam the ship instead.
The beautiful chandelier in the lobby.
The next morning we slept in! The rocking of the ship combined with extremely comfortable mattresses made for a really GOOD night's sleep! Our first full day on board was a day at sea, so there was plenty of time to explore the ship. We had breakfast at Cabana's. They do a great breakfast buffet. You can actually go to any of the dinner rotation restaurants if you want a more sit down meal with servers. We like the casual-ness of Cabana's so we went there most of the time. But the other restaurants have higher class food if that is your thing.
One really fun thing to do on board is the Midship Detective game. Several of the paintings onboard are actually video screens. Go down the Deck 2 in front of the Enchanted Garden restaurant. There is a desk where you pick up a map and a "clue card". Then you hold that card up in front of the magic paintings and they come to life! They give you clues on where you should go next. You will go to a total of 10 paintings spread through the ship in order to solve the mystery. It's a ton of fun even for adults, and you end up touring the entire ship! Very worth the time. We played a dozen times during the duration of the cruise.
We ate lunch in Enchanted Garden. They have a smaller buffet than Cabanas for lunch, but you do get an actual server and a quieter eating place. Enchanted Garden is very pretty, but it's not very Disney. Just one Mickey statue, and that's it. Everything else just kinda looks like an English garden.
After lunch we headed up to deck 12 to play Goofy's mini golf course. So much fun! Try teeing off from Goofy's tees, and you HAVE TO put your feet the same way as the picture on the ground shows. Basically just stand on Goofy's footprints. it makes it a lot more fun!
Max, Goofy's son showed up while we were playing and took pictures with everyone. :) Fun unexpected surprise!
Dinner that first night was our "formal wear" night. I saw people in everything from a cocktail dress, to a prom dress to one woman who I think was in a full opera gown complete with tiara and opera length white gloves. (Seriously, I had to stop and try to decide if she was a princess, or just a guest) I wore an old bridesmaid dress I had not found another use for yet. Formal night is a fun night to get your picture taken on the grand staircase, with the captain or other officers and with the characters in "formal" attire. You can also have the expensive photo place, shutters, do a formal photo shoot of your family if you want to spend the money. They do a reception before dinner in the main lobby. you can stand in a ridiculously long line and get your picture taken with the captain. All the officers are standing around in their formal wear and talk to people while drinks are served. My husband ending up talking to the ships main Engineer the entire time. (my husband is a mechanical engineer.) He tried to get a tour of the engine room, but that is apparently illegal. Hey, he tried!
The deck with the mini golf course is also an excellent place for pictures. Besides, who doesn't want to play mini golf on the top deck of a cruise ship in formal wear??
We had an odd experience on board on that first full day at sea. We noticed that the ship seemed to be turning around. Knowing this was weird.. we went up to the top deck to see what was going on. Shortly after, the captain came on the speakers and told us that they spotted a boat drifting in the water and they were signaling for help. It turned out to be way more than that. We came around and found a handmade "raft" with 4 Cuban refugees onboard. They literally strapped 6 inner tubes together and covered it with a sheet and set sail hoping to reach America.
The crew took the tender boat off the ship and picked up the 4 Cubans. They were kept in seclusion in sick bay until we reached Grand Caymen. Then they were allowed off the ship. We don't know what happened to them after that, but I still pray for them every day. It was a seriously sobering site. There was NOTHING around us but open water for 50+ miles. We found another abandoned vessel on the way back home on day 6. It was spray painted with USCG on it so we assume that they were picked up. (United States Coast Guard)
Dinner that night was at Animator's Palate. By far, the most fun restaurant onboard. :) The whole room is filled with video monitors that look like paintings when you first walk in. Then, as dinner starts, the room transforms. The walls change color, the ceiling changes, and the paintings all come to life. Crush the turtle from Finding Nemo swims through the monitors and interacts with each table that is close to the monitors. He actually talks to the people at the tables and answers questions. It's a lot of fun. This is the main reason you want to call and request a table near the walls! We were so far away from the walls, we could BARELY hear or see Crush. It sucked. We complained and the second night they moved our entire table to a slightly better location.
The show that night was Aladdin. OH MY GOODNESS!! Best show ever! Aladdin was my favorite cartoon growing up and is still in my top 10 favorite movies. The Musical version on board, was soooo worth it! They did an amazing job! I wished I had gone to the special afternoon show at 3pm, and then again to the normal show time. It was SOOOO worth it. The actor who plays Genie was amazing, and he shows up as Genie again in another show later in the week, which is awesome. :)
Our 3rd day was our stop in Grand Cayman. They do not have a dock big enough for a cruise ship, so we park out to sea and then take a tender boat to the island. You board the tender from deck 1. Pretty much the only time you ever see deck 1 since 99% of it is for the crews quarters. We did the "Extreme Dolphin Swim and Turtle Farm" excursion. I highly recommend this one if you want to swim with dolphins. Be warned though, you are not allowed to bring your camera with you unless one member of your party does not swim with the dolphins, and pays to be an observer. They take a ton of pictures of you, and to buy them it costs $160 for a CD of every shot they took. It's worth the price. They take great shots, and lots of them. For my family of 4 we got a CD with 325 pictures on it.
So, for the excursion, you meet your group on the ship and travel together. They take you to a VERY OLD bus which drives you to the dolphin swim and turtle farm. First they let you roam the turtle farm area. It's pretty dang cool. This is the only area where your camera can be used. They raise sea turtles to release into the wild. So they have turtles of every age and size. You get to pick up the smaller ones. All sizes from, fits in your hand size, to 40-50 lbs as big as your torso size. Then they have the REALLY big 300 lb ones that you can see and watch swim. It's a pretty amazing area.
Next we head over the dolphin area! They assign you to smaller groups. Then you start out by walking into a tank with tons of small sting rays. They swim around your feet and legs. (Bit creepy, but cool!) Then the guide picks one up and lets you pet him. They take pictures of you doing this. (They are seriously slimy!) Then you head over to the dolphin tank. They have a 20 foot deep tank for the dolphin, but you stand on a walkway that is submerged to about 3 feet. The dolphins swim right up to you and let you pet them. SO COOL!
They have each person interact with the dolphin on several occasions. Two of which you get to swim out into the big pool and be pushed or pulled by the dolphin.
The Dolphin is pushing my husband by the feet in this picture.
My dad is holding the dolphins flippers in this one and he is pulling dad through the water.
This was a GREAT excursion. If you are going to do a dolphin swim on the western Caribbean cruises, CHOOSE GRAND CAYMEN. The Dolphin places in Mexico are... uh iffy to say the least. The water at the one in Costa Maya was DISGUSTING. You can see it from the dock when you arrive. Believe me, you will like this place MUCH better if you want to swim with a dolphin!
After the excursion we headed back to the port. We had time to do a little shopping around Grand Cayman, then it was back on board the Fantasy. We didn't feel rushed or anything so it was a good stop.
On board, we had dinner at Enchanted Garden. Overall, this was my least favorite restaurant. It's pretty, but it's just not as cool as they make it out to be. Yes, the walls and ceiling change color as day turns to night, but really.. it happens sooooooo sllllllooooowwwww that you don't even notice, and the difference really isn't as cool as advertised. Still, the food is awesome as usual and right outside the restaurant is the detective game, so at least you can entertain yourself before hand. The show that night was "Wishes". It's about 3 best friends who spend their senior class trip at Disneyland and wind up on a magical adventure with lots of Disney characters. It was really good and certainly one I'd like to see again. The number of trap doors, and fireworks, etc that they can do on one stage inside a cruise ship is truly amazing.
Enchanted Garden. Mind you, there are only 8 booths. You most likely will NOT be sitting in one of them at dinner. But, if you for lunch or breakfast you can sit in them.
The next day we hit Costa Maya, Mexico. Hmmm. How to describe this nicely.... It's a run down, creepy and a bit scary little place to stop. LOL, ok, so maybe not so nicely. It ONLY exists when there is a cruise ship in town. I'm not kidding. The entire population lives in Cancun, and they only come to town when a cruise ship is scheduled. They created this little "town" right at the port. Several little shops and things which are nice, but if you leave their little safe haven.. prepare for some scary moments. We decided to take the Chaccobean Mayan Ruins excursion. Pyramids in Mexico? Sounds fun! So, we board this old bus and start the one hour drive into the interior of the country. Every 2 miles was a guard station. Literally there were 5-10 men at each station armed with huge assault rifles searching all cars. Our bus was exempt from these stops, but they still waved us on by pointing the rifles at us then gesturing with the gun for us to pass. hmm. Friendly. Apparently it's to stop drug smugglers. Then you pass a lot of run down shacks with poor people trying to sell pineapple they cut up and put in baggies to the travelers. The problem? you feel really bad for this obviously VERY poor people, but we cannot buy anything from them. The bus has no windows to roll down, and we arent' allowed to stop, so the tourists cannot even buy the pineapples. Over all, the entire interior of Mexico between the dock and the ruins was VERY depressing. Once we arrived at the ruins, there were patrols of guards armed with assault rifles patrolling every where. I can't even count how many times I had a gun pointed at me. Not exactly calming... The ruins themselves were pretty cool. Except when you find out that they were all repaired. yep. They took thousand year old pyramids and added cement, and made them pretty for the tourists. Some of them were over 80% new material. My husband was able to drag this information out of one of the guards who was following our group when we were stuck in a rain storm. Made them a whole lot less cool.
Typical Pineapple stand on the side of the road.
The Highly Repaired Ruins
Overall, next time we go, if the ship stops in Costa Maya, I'm staying on board the Fantasy and will enjoy the Aqua Duck while the others go see Mexico.
Dinner that night was back to the Royal Table. This night was especially annoying with the photographer in the lobby flashing pictures every few seconds. I hope no one in our room had a pacemaker, because it was a strobe light effect. My mom was funny this night. She couldn't decide between 3 different meals. So, instead of helping her choose, the server just brought out all three dishes! Lesson learned, if you can't decide, order them all! LOL
The show for the evening was "Magic Dave". He was the comedian they had on board for our cruise. I think this show changes each cruise. They made it sound like he was onboard for a limited time. Anyway, he was hilarious! He brought kids on stage and got them to say and do the funniest things. He was a magician and a comedian wrapped into one. Apparently he did several shows in the D lounge on board the ship. (the comedy club) Honestly, we were so busy with everything else on the ship we never made it to the extra shows or even to the night clubs. There is so much to do.. You just have to pick the things that are important to you and save the rest for your next cruise! The only shows we made it to were the after dinner scheduled live theatre. We did go see the Avengers in the ships movie theatre. (At the time, it wasn't even playing yet on land.)
So, I'm realizing how long this blog is getting. I'm the type of person who likes to have ALL the information before I go on a new trip or experience, so I'm trying to write this for those of you who are like me. :) I'll break it into two parts. So consider this part one. :) Check my blog for part two. I'm writing this on 8/1/13, so give me a couple of days before the next part is posted. :) I'm also going to compile a list of "Tips and Hints" that I will post as well. Call it a condensed version of this. Thanks for reading! I hope you get to enjoy a Disney Cruise yourself really soon! They are SOOO worth it!
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